- First Name
- Mark
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- Oct 30, 2021
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- St. Jacob, IL
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- 2021 Badlands | 2020 Escape
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My wife and I flew out to Ogden, UT from our home near Saint Louis to take a week-long motorcycle trip around southern Utah with my brother and his wife. Our ride for the week was my brother's Harley-Davidson Pan America. For those interested, this is a very capable machine, both on- and off-road. My only complaints about it are the locks on the bags (there is no way to leave them closed but unlocked) and the infernal side stand. For some reason, HD decided to design it such that you have to lean the bike to the right to deploy the side stand on the left. Idiocy. The ride, however, is wonderful, and even two-up with overstuffed bags, we still had gobs of power.
To the subject of the post: Our motorcycle trip ended on Thursday the 12th, and our original plan was to wing our way home on Friday. After checking, however, I realized the weather on Saturday in southeast Utah/northwest New Mexico would be ideal for watching the eclipse on Saturday. We decided to stay an extra day and take a detour to the south through Albuquerque instead of heading directly east to Saint Louis.
Our flight plan had us taking off from Ogden at 0845, which would put overhead Four Corners at totality. We were just a couple of minutes early, but the views along the way were terrific.
This is looking East while traversing the Salt Lake valley southbound. The fall colors on the Wasatch range were incredible this year following an unusually wet spring/summer.
Near Glen Canyon Recreational Area in Utah.
The north end of Lake Powell, with Navajo Mountain off in the distance.
As totality approached, the sun was dimmed, but because this was an annular eclipse not to complete darkness like a full eclipse. You can see in the photo below the sky is pretty dark, and the light appears to be about the same level as a sunrise even though this was 1030. (The cannulas supply oxygen for flying at altitude in an unpressurized aircraft. We were at 12,000 feet.)
This was looking east, toward the sun. You can see sky is darker around the sun than you would expect at mid-morning.
During the actual eclipse we each had a pair of solar filters mounted in a cardboard frame you can buy in any convenience store during solar events. I held one of the filters over my phone's camera lens to capture the following shots:
Click this link to view a 25-second video I captured.
Just to keep this somewhat applicable to the crowd, we noticed a group of travelers parked in the desert to watch the show. If you look very, very closely (just ahead of the landing light lens) one of them looks like it could be a Bronco Sport. I think.
We added several hours to our flight time back to Saint Louis, but it was well worth it for this once-in-a-lifetime experience.
To the subject of the post: Our motorcycle trip ended on Thursday the 12th, and our original plan was to wing our way home on Friday. After checking, however, I realized the weather on Saturday in southeast Utah/northwest New Mexico would be ideal for watching the eclipse on Saturday. We decided to stay an extra day and take a detour to the south through Albuquerque instead of heading directly east to Saint Louis.
Our flight plan had us taking off from Ogden at 0845, which would put overhead Four Corners at totality. We were just a couple of minutes early, but the views along the way were terrific.
This is looking East while traversing the Salt Lake valley southbound. The fall colors on the Wasatch range were incredible this year following an unusually wet spring/summer.
Near Glen Canyon Recreational Area in Utah.
The north end of Lake Powell, with Navajo Mountain off in the distance.
As totality approached, the sun was dimmed, but because this was an annular eclipse not to complete darkness like a full eclipse. You can see in the photo below the sky is pretty dark, and the light appears to be about the same level as a sunrise even though this was 1030. (The cannulas supply oxygen for flying at altitude in an unpressurized aircraft. We were at 12,000 feet.)
This was looking east, toward the sun. You can see sky is darker around the sun than you would expect at mid-morning.
During the actual eclipse we each had a pair of solar filters mounted in a cardboard frame you can buy in any convenience store during solar events. I held one of the filters over my phone's camera lens to capture the following shots:
Click this link to view a 25-second video I captured.
Just to keep this somewhat applicable to the crowd, we noticed a group of travelers parked in the desert to watch the show. If you look very, very closely (just ahead of the landing light lens) one of them looks like it could be a Bronco Sport. I think.
We added several hours to our flight time back to Saint Louis, but it was well worth it for this once-in-a-lifetime experience.
